Make Everything Cheaper

Suggestions
1

Let me start by saying this is not a complaint about crafting costs, and I realize the subject of the economy has been beaten to near-death, but considering the recent scarcity of high level items I feel this is warranted.

I propose we keep the same mat cost per recipe of all non-block craftables but substantially increase the output of bulk and mass craft, as well as any single craft that makes sense. Like 2-4 times as much output. Is that crazy? Maybe. But no crazier than the biggest malls in the galaxy being out of forged tools, speed brews (I know- gleambows right now), teaching pies, etc.

We want to make the game more fair and more fun for everyone, including new players. Iā€™ve been brainstorming the effects and hereā€™s what Iā€™ve come up with so far:

Main effects, accounting for the ā€˜twice as muchā€™ scenario-

  1. Everything is slightly cheaper.
  • Problem: High level stuff is too expensive for casual players while chronic grinders can buy out a whole store.
  • Sellers donā€™t even need to cut prices in half. Imagine youā€™re selling teaching pies for 400ea when crafting 50 (20k revenue). Now the same mats create 100 pies and you sell them for 250ea. Thatā€™s 25k in revs for half the grind and the buyer gets the same amount of pies for 5/8 the cost. Win-winā€¦
    Btw Iā€™m going to use the word ā€œgrindā€ a lot here so be ready.
  1. Inventory stays stocked.
  • Problem: Ugh- empty shop stands. Everywhere.
  • How nice would it be if you needed something and KNEW that you could find it at the same shop you got it from last time? That peace of mind is becoming increasingly more rare and it pushes us experienced players into crafting ourselves and taking even more money out of the economy.
  1. Less time grinding, of course.
  • Problem: Iā€™ve pointed out the irony on numerous occasions that the most successful and reliable shop owners are the ones who get burnt out the quickest and end up quitting the game. They have the best prices that casuals canā€™t compete with, effectively cornering the market, then :dash: theyā€™re gone and their customers are lost and flood to the shop with the next best price or, again, craft their own and take their money out of the economy. I donā€™t blame the shop owners- I blame the grind and have always felt bad for those who have to turn it into a daily job to stay reliable.
  • While sellers still need to grind the same amount for the first craft, a 30-minute-per-day grind for sweet beans can thereafter be matched in 15 minutes, or 30 minutes every other day. You can finally PLAY the game again with that extra time youā€™d have spent WORKING.
  1. Less time shoppingā€¦ and not giving up looking.
  • Problem: Going from planet to planet looking at the knowledge tab is annoying. Especially when you figure what youā€™re looking for has to be available on Gyosha or Tana. Thatā€™s enough for me to call it a day and switch gamesā€¦ and take my money out of the economyā€¦
  • This is solved with better-stocked inventories outlined above.
  1. Wider variety of goods and easier to maintain multiple shops.
  • Problem: Amalgamation of the problems above.
  • If a seller is now spending half the time grinding for diamond hammers, or can make twice as much refined diamond, they have the option to add axes and shovels to their business. Or they can produce twice as many hammers and sell them at two shops.

In addition to these outlined effects on the economy, there would be reverberating side effects, like the following:

  1. Mat ā€œfarmsā€, specifically areas that are reserved so that a particular surface mat hotspot isnā€™t plotted and built on, could potentially be smaller. Those who reserved them to hit during their daily grind may not feel as pressured to gather as much every day and could therefore be more economical with their reserved plots.

  2. Some regen farms can be smaller. While I donā€™t believe this change should necessarily extend to block crafting recipes, for reasons Iā€™ll detail below, some blocks are used in recipes I do think should be affected. If sand and silty soil combined to make a full glass block, rather than half of one, we might end up with smaller (or less) sand and silty farms.

  3. Consider the plight of the farmer. Just kidding. But seriously, if I harvest all of my crops at one time (currently growing a small amount of each of the organic crops, havenā€™t built any inorganic farms yet), it takes my farmer alt over 30 minutes between harvesting and planting and only gets him like 3k experience. If I craft/cook all the recipes I can make every day then it does get the daily xp. With updated quantities though, I could have a smaller, more manageable farm to get the same output and could spend more time gathering beans etc with that alt.

  4. There would be less interruptions to BUILDING. I play the game to build. This is a little more general of an effect so to tag a specific experience- I used to get transform chisels from a shop near most of my builds. Of course they were always running out (see ā€œinventory stays stockedā€) and I didnā€™t stockpile/hoard them out of principle. Well that shop owner got BURNT OUT from spending days gathering mats then forging everything that would sell out in minutes, and closed his shop. Fortunately heā€™s a saint and a bro and continued making me stuff whenever I was desperate. Still, there was downtime from building to wait for chisels which only got worse when I had to start shopping for them. Due to the unreliable market, I now forge them myself. This takes much longer than running over to buy them, and takes my money out of the economy. And I use a lot of transform chisels.

  5. Perhaps I shouldnā€™t have saved the most important point for last as Iā€™m sure Iā€™ve lost most readers by now, but, lastly, THERE WILL BE MORE PLAYERS. For all of the reasons I believe this update would improve everyoneā€™s Boundless experience, it would greatly increase player retention. Less burnt-out grinders, less depressingly empty shops, less wasted/uneconomical/inefficient plots, less building downtime, more money, more variety, more TIME to be Boundless!

Details on updated recipes:

  • With regards to the production flow, building block output should remain as it is. We already get 50 stones blocks from only 18 rocks, and each block is the same volume. It wouldnā€™t make sense to get a crazy amount of stones to make even more refined rock to make even more marble. With other items like diamond hammers being more plentiful, itā€™ll be easier to mine more rocks anyway. We will get the same amount of marble per craft, but will have more bonding agent to work with.
  • Mass craft of gems in the compactor would still yield 50 compact gems, but double the output of refined gems. This way we still get the same amount of ā€œbuilding blocksā€ and wouldnā€™t be double-dipping on the updated output.
  • Tool output would also remain the same because we have more mats.

While I could spend the time running through scenarios for every recipe, I think I established enough points of reference to apply to all aspects of the game and donā€™t want to keep boring you. I ask you now to envision how you spend your time playing and what this update could do for you. Then take a moment to imagine yourself as a new(ish) and possibly skeptical player and how this would affect your experience and willingness to press on.

Thanks!
(10 characters)
Jk

8 Likes
2

I believe itā€™s mostly a discovery issue, which the BUTT tool is trying to solve. The game was a lot better when finding what you want was easier. It wonā€™t completely fix it (forged stuff, specific colors etc) but does help a lot. Shouldnā€™t be too long now until itā€™s up again.

Empty shop stand/basket is simply a filled market order in a traditional AH system, those are expected and healthy, means that resources are flowing. Itā€™s not feasible for a single player to supply the needs of the whole playerbase and keep a well priced order stocked 24/7. The issue is that itā€™s hard to find the next best place to buy it after the first one is bought out.

6 Likes
3

The BUTT tool is awesome, as are the other helpful online resources like DKā€™s site and the classic planet colors spreadsheet. Thing is, they arenā€™t part of the game. Iā€™m a weirdo and never want to put my controller down when Iā€™m playing.

Difficulty finding items doesnā€™t singlehandedly ruin the game. If twice as many tools existed in game though I think it would eliminate the issue of scarcity.

BUTT would be just as useful, if not more so. With more options we would use it to find the best price of all of them, rather than to find out where the only item of its kind is selling.

4

Yes doubling everything would make everything more plentiful, but I was trying to say that the scarcity problem the suggestion is trying to fix might not exist, but feels true because itā€™s hard to find what youā€™re looking for.

2 Likes
5

Iā€™m about a month old now, I think I qualify as new. To be honest I donā€™t have trouble finding tools/brews/teaching pies, but maybe Iā€™m not playing as much as you are :slight_smile:

Changing the ratios between inputs and outputs mean that fewer people / less time is needed on inputs. Economically, that is a nerf to people who rely on inputs for coin, and buffs people who already have supply chains set up to process inputs into profit.

In your scenario it is true that buyers can buy outputs for cheaper, but their inputs will also become cheaper since fewer inputs are necessary. Itā€™s about the relative balance that determines a healthy economy, where healthy (from my PoV) means ā€œbalanced so that new players can make similar coin/hr as established players.ā€ What counts as ā€œsimilarā€ is just opinion.

An economy is built of specialists who have a reason to specialize. In the real world itā€™s because different people have different talents, skills, education, capital access, and passion. In Boundless you can build your skill tree however you want (veterans with many skill pages have an advantage here too), but the biggest difference between new and old players is capital access, which would be monotonically favoring old players if not for the analogue to passion. Because there are tasks that people donā€™t want to do or have time to do, but require little capital, new players have a way into the economy.

As long as people wish for less required gathering, the economy is healthy.

The appropriate solution to a supply problem is to help new players get what they need to enter the economy (AoE tools for mining, grapple for gathering, slingbow for hunting, etc.)

3 Likes
6

I agree and really wasnā€™t trying to be too critical in my OP. My idea isnā€™t really a design to fix anything as it is to make the game/grind more casual-friendly.

7

If you want stimulus along the lines of real world stimulus with controlled inflation, one idea is to offer all players a credit line of 10k coin with x% interest (which is actually a coin sink), allowing a new player to immediately purchase their first tools and become economically productive.

Note that the real world economy crashes whenever there is a credit crunch but in Boundless there does not even exist a credit system.

1 Like
8

I always had your same stance on keeping the economy as natural and realistic as possible. One major thing you will encounter after a year or so is how many established and wealthy players simply disappear, and often times their assets with them. Not to bankruptcy or debts, as we see all the time irl with corporations of the past, but at the height of their wealth.

And they arenā€™t spreading their wealth in a will to a bunch of children and grandchildren. Thereā€™s just suddenly one less person making an impact on the world and the economy.

4 Likes
9

Iā€™m also against adding random money. That doesnā€™t add production and items. It just goes to the same shop owners who donā€™t feel like producing more than they do.

This isnā€™t an effort to fix the economy. Like I said I think it would just make playing every day a little more comfortable and would allow players to have more fun with the game. I just think it would boost the economy as a biproduct.

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My stance is less that ā€œthe economy should be like the real worldā€ and more that ā€œan economy is built of interactions between people and hence you can think of causes/effects like the real world.ā€ Actually, what I want is for an unrealistic economy in the sense that I want access-to-capital to matter less haha.

As long as the game wants to have an economy mechanic and isnā€™t creative mode, real world economic theory to some extent can be applied. Whether the game should be more like creative mode is another debate :stuck_out_tongue:

I have to be honest, I donā€™t know what the effect of disappearing players is on the economy. If it is true that there is only 1 person capable of turning an input into an output, I see how thatā€™s a big issue. But as long as there exist people producing inputs, and people willing to turn them into outputs, I donā€™t think I see the problem. The thing that matters isnā€™t just how many assets they had when they died, but their flow rate of inputs consumed/produced and outputs consumed/produced. If Iā€™m super rich but never interacted with the economy anyway (0 flow rate) you wonā€™t notice when Iā€™m gone. Thatā€™s another reason to balance the coin/hr between all players in a way that isnā€™t based on wealthā€“if everyone has similar flow rates then it matters less when a whale disappears.

Not proposing adding random money. Like I said, a loan of 10k is a coin sink, and also uniformly/universally distributed. It is also not random, itā€™s targeted stimulus to alleviate the problem of capital access.

If the new player economy isnā€™t considered, I think doubling all outputs will make the new player experience worse and be more fun for veterans. The key point I am making is that the balance between both has to be considered. The place where the economy doesnā€™t matter is creative mode or solo mode, in which case anything goes.

1 Like
11

Nova Golda Market! More than one forging shop on the premises with stock. Mega Fast in stock, plus Teaching Pies!

Of course also the 3 gleambow consumables!

Start shopping at Nova Golda Market, we got ya covered!

5 Likes
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Iā€™ve also liked buying forged items recently from the basement of the fantasy tree hub and havenā€™t had any issues with stock there as well.

1 Like
13

I think it would be great for new players. Really the bare bones idea is to alleviate some grind. I personally am not asking for the game to be easier for me but basing this idea off of historical comments on the forum. Many people quit the game due to grind.

For what itā€™s worth, Iā€™m not an archetypical veteran. Iā€™ve never opened a portal, donā€™t make my own consumables, forged for the first time ever 2 weeks ago, and never sold anything that wasnā€™t just excess stuff I donā€™t use. I donā€™t grind regularly because Iā€™ve found a way to prosper without it, and when I need mats in a pinch I have fun with an afternoon of mining or gathering every few weeks. I have a lot of coin and mats and Iā€™m lucky enough to have amazing guild mates who come drop diamond hammers on me when Iā€™m ranting about shops being empty. Thatā€™s why itā€™s painful to watch established players with famous shops and builds quit the game.

Unfortunately it seems the common theme is that when someone leaves, they leave for good. That might be because they canā€™t imagine returning to that same daily grind- that 2nd job. Itā€™s like once youā€™re at a point where people are relying on you thereā€™s no middle ground between devoting the majority of your free time to grinding and just not playing at all.

Boundless is my favorite game as it is and I intend to play forever. I just want to see more life, more like it was in the first month after release. If increasing the production output to allow all players more freedom to break the cycle of gathering, crafting, and shop maintenance could potentially boost player retention then it should be considered.

2 Likes
14

You donā€™t until you do. If I started going there and buying out the whole stand every time (I wonā€™t!) then you would have to find something new.

The scarcity situation is what escalated this idea in my mind but itā€™s all about the amount of grind that not enough people want to put in.

15

I mean. Itā€™s an MMO and I know everyone has their own opinions and differences on what that entails, but for me the grind is part of it. I personally think that everything doesnā€™t need to be accessable to everyone. I started playing a month ago. I have lucent gear. Forged. Gem gear forged. Havenā€™t had any issues finding it. Get tossed free things by people all the time. Personally I felt like my new player experience and grind was too easy. Iā€™ve already made my first 100k and have 100k worth of stock in my shop already. I in no means had any trouble starting up and getting going so I always wonder what people talk about when they say the new player experience is too much of a grind.

I think there needs to be weapons or something that is only available to top level players, requiring epic skills or mastering of your craft. I personally feel like getting end game equipment has been too easy and needs to be more difficult to aquire in certain scenarios.

6 Likes
16

Changing the output quantities on crafting would just lower the value of ingredients even more since the consumption of the end product remains the same.

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17

I enjoyed the early game too and Iā€™m fine with the grind my builds require, for the most part. You and I are among a few hundred active players.

Ask the tens of thousands of past players why they quit and youā€™ll see tens of thousands of people cite the grind.

You havenā€™t owned a forge or consumables shop. Or high level building mats like concrete and deco marble and mosaic. Thatā€™s a whole different level of grind, and one that I want no part of. Thank god some people enjoy or we wouldnā€™t have an economy.

When there are 300 active players and, say, 100,000 people who own the game and refuse to return, itā€™s time to consider ways to prevent people from burning out.

My 5 real life friends I started with all quit because of the grind. They ā€œdonā€™t have timeā€ for it. Theyā€™re part of the 99% of game owners who ā€œdonā€™t have timeā€. We on the forum like to write them off as impatient idiots butā€¦ not all are. And some could return if they could reopen their old shop and spend a fraction of the time managing it than they used to.

2 Likes
18

I guess thatā€™s also true. Iā€™m a gatherer. So I make tons of money from beans and leaves really. But it funds everything I possibly need to do in the game and I never hurt for money. Iā€™ve seen what has to go into lucent forging and I definitely donā€™t have the drive for that sort of thing.

2 Likes
19

This is an interesting idea. But i donā€™t think this will play out the way youā€™ve described it.

Besides the fact that thereā€™s still plenty of stocked forged tools (you just need to know where to look, maybe expand your range of shops you visit?), the only real rare materials are mostly hunt materials.

Iā€™ve always been pretty vocal about there not being enough hopper cores and hopper eyes. But you know whatā€™s beautiful? The market and the game have corrected themselves.

Because vigour 2 and corrupt have become so expensive, instead of paying increasingly high prices, people have just changed their forging decks. In the past few weeks, iā€™ve been selling over 10k pure 3 per week, where normally iā€™d craft a few ss a month.

Doubling output will also not help new players. It will most likely hinder them instead. One of the biggest incomes for new players, is gathering (due to it needing next to no investment). If you double outputs, suddenly people need a lot less materials. Not only that, but the price of the gathered materials will drop due to less demand for them.

Disagree. Even a lvl 10 player can earn 100k an hour. Sure, end-game players may be able to make more money, but thatā€™s because they have been playing longer, have more stock, more knowledge, etc. Everything doesnā€™t HAVE to be equal. Itā€™s good to have something to work towards, a reward for making it this far.

I can guarantee you that the vast majority of this is due to players quitting. This happens in every game. Besides, even my shop has empty stands of the most common items sometimes. Thatā€™s mostly because i canā€™t be online 24/7 to restock the second i get bought out. Even if you double, or triple the output of items, neither of these will change.

People who canā€™t keep up simply need to raise their prices. If they wonā€™t, they only have themselves to blame. When my shop became known to the bigger forgers and iā€™d get bought out weekly, i did the exact same thing. Now my prices balance between me being able to keep stocked and still being able to sell my wares. Finding this balance is the key.

Bit of a silly argument. Majority of shops will still congregate on the same few planets. Even if you double output, players will still buy out certain items. I buy out certain items across the universe sometimes. If stock doubled or even tripled, i would still do that. It takes time to restock. If you happen to shop after me, you just have to be patient for people to restock.

Ok, but this is an MMO. It caters to a ton of different people. Itā€™s not just a creative builder game :slight_smile: This change might be good for you, but might not be good for a host of other players and playstyles.

I donā€™t think this change would do anything of the sort. For the same reason i think AOE planting would do nothing in the end. This is a similar situation. People are not going to make their farms smaller because it returns more.

In the end, i understand where youā€™re coming from. But simply increasing output is not the solution youā€™re looking for. Give a man 100 blocks and heā€™ll build a house. Give a man 1000 blocks and heā€™ll build a bigger house, not the same 100 block house and sell the other 900. I hope that analogy makes sense >.>

6 Likes
20

Well, everything is so cheap now daysā€¦
They need to balance the value for every categoryā€™s item. like food / tool / weapon/ machineā€¦etc
Right now a lot of business cost too many time. You need to grind a lot to prepare a lot of stocks of items to actually earn the money. Current econ in game is kind of using your time to exchange the rewardā€¦
For a lot of MMOā€™s grinding, RNG take a very important spot. Sometimes you are lucky you save your time for gathering. It assign items itā€™s value. Also the feeling to get the rare drop is very nice too.

In my opinion, all the building blocks should be cheap (except the animation blocks or furniture blocks or even trophy blocks), so players can use more different blocks for building which is good for the game. All the tool, machine, food that has function should be more value and more special on itā€™s effect, so players can host good business for that. Means less grinding, but more income. The best result is we can sell our luck, not our time. Now I really feel I am using my time to exchange limited income which is not worth.

1 Like